Beans in a Can.
by eenodol
Summary: Lila is hungry.. and just plain dumb. Curly is my personal favorite. Boy, do I ever love Curly! Curly does magic in this story. EDIT: For all of you who were horribly confused by the ending to this story, here is a new version that is much more sensic


Beans in a Can (by eenodol.)  
  
  
  
"MacArthurPark is melting in the dark.  
All the sweet green icing flowing down.  
Someone left the cake out in the rain.  
  
MacArthur Park is melting in the dark.  
All that sweet green icing is flowing down.  
Someone left the cake out in the rain.  
I don't think that I can take it.  
'Cause it took so long to make it.  
And I'll never have that recipe again.  
Oh no! Oh no!"  
  
- "MacArthur Park."   
  
Words and music by Jimmy Webb, 1968.  
  
  
  
Lila bounced across her bed, narrowly avoiding hitting her head on the wooden bars supporting the pink canopy. "But I don't think I can take it!" she hollered at the top of her lungs, singing along with the fast paced disco music. She tumbled off her bed and landed on her shoulder. "Ow," she squeaked. Sitting up, she realized she was hungry. "I'm hungry," she said. So she walked downstairs to the kitchen. "Mmm.. Beans in a can!" After searching the entire first floor, Lila was still unable to find a can opener. "Hmm.. Maybe I can just try using this here rock! It worked when I opened that ham sandwich!"   
  
So Lila hit the can with the rock repeatedly, but the can just dented. "Oh! If I'd wanted a dented can, I'd have gotten it out of the bargain bin at the Dollar Tree! I wonder if any of my ever so wonderful classmates has a can opener I can borrow?"  
  
"Tra la la," Lila chirped as she skipped down the cracked cement stairs of her apartment building carrying her beans in a can. Unfortunately, the can did not open when Lila fell down those last four steps, or else she could have just eaten her snack and gone back to the pulsating haven of disco music. "Ouch ouch tra la ouch tra la la ouch." After lying stunned for a moment, Lila got up, dusted off her pretty little green dress, and skipped merrily off to her buddy Gerald's house.  
  
Timberly answered the door at Gerald's house breathlessly, pigtails bouncing. "Hi Lila! Are you selling Campfire Lass chocolate turtles?"  
  
"No, I'm afraid not, dearest Timberly. Today I'm here on a mission. An oh so important mission. May I speak to your ever so wonderful older, but not oldest brother?"  
  
"Okay Lila! Just a minute! Can you take care of my Wally doll while I get him?"  
  
"Of course dearest Timberly, I'd love to ever so much!"   
  
Timberly skipped off to retrieve her brother while Lila stood on the doorstep, singing, "Tra la la! Tra la la!" to the tune of the Wally the Alligator song. Soon Jamie O came to the door.  
  
"You wanted me, Lila?"  
  
"Oh no! I meant your ever so wonderful younger brother! I'm ever so sorry that I bothered you, Jamie O!"  
  
"No problemo, Lila babe. I'll get him for you." Jamie O turned around and screamed, "Gerald! Get down here, you miserable twerp!"  
  
"Wha-wha-wha-wha-what?" Gerald stuttered as he fell down the stairs.  
  
Jamie O turned and walked back into the kitchen without so much as an "Oh, Lila's here."  
  
"Oh, hey Lila, think you could, uh, untwist my legs?"  
  
"Oh, of course Gerald! There you go."  
  
"Thank ya's. So, what're you here for?"  
  
"Oh Gerald!" Lila wailed, "I've got a horrible, horrible can opening problem!"  
  
"Have you tried a rubber mallet?"  
  
"Well, no, but, yes, but, the point is that doesn't work!"  
  
"Well then I'm afraid I can't help you." Gerald snatched the Wally doll from Lila's arms and firmly shut the door in her face.  
  
"Oh dear me," Lila moaned. "I guess I'll go to Helga's house. I'm sure she'll help me! She's ever so sweet." It was an uneventful skip to Helga's house. Helga answered the door.  
  
"Well hello there, little princess," Helga sneered. "What do you want?"  
  
"Oh Helga! I need your help! I'm ever so hungry and I don't have a can opener! Could you help me open these beans in a can?"  
  
"Well, I do have that can ope- wait, I mean, there's only one surefire way to open beans in a can."  
  
"Oh Helga, could you possibly be kind enough to share it with me?"  
  
"Well, it's kind of complicated. Stay here while I get my video camera."  
  
"Sure!" Lila squeaked. "Tra la la," she sang, rocking back and forth on the soles of her feet. Soon Helga returned.  
  
"Okay Lila, here's what ya do. First, ya put the can on your head." So Lila put the can on her head. "Now, ya do a little jig while singing the Canada's National Anthem. Now touch your toes without bending your knees or dropping the can. Now spin around in a circle forty-seven times. Got that?"  
  
"Oh Helga, I'm ever so dizzy!" Lila blurted out, her face slowly turning a lovely shade of puce.  
  
"Well keep spinning, bucko. You need to be a lot pucer than that! Don't stop now or you'll have to start over! And it won't work! But you'll have to start over anyway! Or else, for the next eighteen years, ever single pair of shoelaces you buy will snap within twelve days of purchase, not twelve days of use."  
  
"Okay, Helga, I'm all done!"  
  
"Now the final step, smash the can into your forehead."  
  
"Ouch! Oh Helga, that hurt ever so much, and the can didn't even open!"  
  
"Oh well, I guess you should have spun around only forty-two times. Can't undo it now! Buh bye!" Helga slammed the door in Lila's face.   
  
Lila began to walk down the road dejectedly. As she passed the city zoo, she realized Curly was the can opening soul for whom she vainly searched. Legend had it he could open cans using only his face.  
  
Lila began to stumble towards Curly's house, her vision obscured by a strange swirling dot thing, probably a result of Helga's beans in a can opening method. As she crossed the street she was spotted by The Jolly Olly Man.   
  
"Small child crossing the street? Hurray! Ramming speed time!" The Jolly Olly Man slammed on the gas and sped towards her small form. Fortunately, Lila dropped her beans in a can and followed them into the sewer before the speeding ice cream truck could hit her.   
  
"Curly? Why ever are you down here under the city?"  
  
"What? How did you know I was under the city? No one knows I'm under the city! No one but me! And… Them," he said, whispering the last sentence.  
  
"Them? Who's Them?"  
  
"I can't tell you, Lila. You see, they would be angered with me and then I would have to kill you so they wouldn't kill me. MWAUAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"  
  
"Um, actually Curly, I just wanted your help opening this here can of beans in a can! You see, Gerald couldn't help me, and then Helga tried, but I messed it up by accident. It wasn't her fault, she tried to help me."  
  
"Well sure I can open that there can of beans in a can! Sit it down on the ground, right there," he said, pointing to the cement in front of him.  
  
"But it's just ever so dirty down here in the sewer!"  
  
"Put it down, Lila!" Curly hollered.  
  
"Okay." So she did.  
  
"Alakazam!" Curly yelled, "Open open open open open! Hey, why does this can have a dent in the side of it? Did you get it from the Dollar Tree?"  
  
"Oh no, I tried to open it with a rock."  
  
"Well, that doesn't work!" Curly kicked the can as hard as he could. "Ow!" he yelled. "Open open open open open! Darnit! That's like some kinda super can! I think we need a can opener. Unfortunately, I don't have one. Well, bye!"  
  
"But wait, Curly! You haven't tried to open it with your face!"  
  
"Oh that? I can't really do that! That's just an urban legend! It was started many years ago by a strange man with an eye patch and three peg legs. I mean arms, three peg arms. Well, bye."  
  
"Oh gosh!" Lila exclaimed. "I'm almost late to school!" So she ran off to school through the city sewer system. "Maybe someone at school can help me!"  
  
Arriving at school, Lila realized it was lunchtime. Over the loudspeaker the announcement came. "Today's lunch is beans on a tray with fish dogs in a sesame bun, broccoli wedges, and chilled milk."  
  
"Oh no!" Lila squealed, "I don't want beans on a tray! I want beans in a can!" But Lila got in line for lunch behind Stinky anyway, hoping that she might find a can opener in her serving of broccoli wedges.   
  
"And that's why my favorite kind of puddin' is lemon puddin'," Stinky told the lunch lady. Lila prodded Stinky in the bottom with her plastic fork.   
  
"Ask them if they can open my can of beans," she hissed.  
  
The lunch ladies overheard her and screamed, "If you want non-cafeteria food, maybe you shouldn't be at school getting an education, you pompous little brat! And that goes for you snack food eaters too!"  
  
Lila jumped and ran out of the cafeteria.  
  
"Get back here you little bugger!" they hollered behind her. "Get back and give us the respect we deserve! And that goes for you not-exact-changers too! Get out of my cafeteria and stay out, you assuming little brats! Why would we have change for a five? Why would we be able to let you buy just a milk when the smallest ya gots is a one? You heard me! Knock it off before I kill the lot of ya and make ya into chicken rings! Little snotty boy and girl rings are more like it!"  
  
Immediately after the lunch lady began threatening them, the cafeteria emptied. Lila found her group of friends on the playground eating their wide variety of homemade lunches.   
  
"Where have you been all day, Lila?" Helga asked.  
  
Lila stared at Helga, cocked her head, blinked her eyes, and told the rest of the group the story.  
  
"So then she brought me this little midget, and I asked her, 'What's that?' And she said, 'That's exactly what you asked for!' And I said, 'Oh no! I believe you're ever so mistaken! I asked for beans in a can!' Then she looked at me and said, 'Beans in a can? I thought you said smelly little man!'"  
  
  



End file.
